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Just w right!

  • 29/11/1996

Just  w right! environment does not respect political boundaries and, therefore, environmental journalists are truly internationalists, or they ought to be. This privilege at the same time calls for certain responsibilities. One key responsibility is to create a just communication order.

A sense of justice is central to the environmental concern. But have Western journalists, who control global information, been applying this sense of justice in their professional practice? Let some examples speak for themselves.
Distorted viewpoint Western reporters are deeply concerned about the fictitious or actual nuclear bombs of India and Pakistan while the stockpiles of nuclear bombs owned by Western powers are a non-issue. The World Health Organization resolution asking the World Court on the legality of using nuclear weapons, and the subsequent introduction of a broader resolution in the un General Assembly by g-77 (developing countries and China), although crucial global initiatives, were not worthy of mention to Western media practitioners.

Environmental reports concerning Zimbabwe unfailingly blame the people for habitat degradation, but when it comes to the issue of land reforms that would provide land to the poor peasants, these reports are vocal in their disapproval as that would harm white interests. That an equitable distribution of farmlands is the key means to reverse the trend of biodiversity loss bears no meaning for them.

The examples are numerous and varied. However, the pattern is the same: delegetimise the developing countries and their genuine concerns and tacitly promote Western interests through false assumptions and pushing pseudo-solutions. The extent of the malady is so great that this genre of media professionals could justly be called

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